Friday, February 8, 2002
Men’s volleyball It's not an endangered species.
far from extinction
But the sport isn't growing, either,
and that has some coaches concernedBy Grace Wen
gwen@starbulletin.comCollegiate men's volleyball is not on the verge of extinction. At least not in the minds of those closely associated with the sport.
Coaches of Division I men's volleyball do not believe the sport is in trouble. The general feeling among them is that volleyball is in a cryogenic state -- it's not dying, it's frozen.
"There's a freeze on men's volleyball," UCLA coach Al Scates, winner of 18 national championships explained. "You can't add a team. Any program with a football team can't add a team because of Title IX. They'd be sued by the women advocates so basically we're frozen. But when we started in 1970, we had 24 Div. I, II, and III teams. Now I think we have 81.
"(So) it's healthier than ever and the talent pool is fantastic. Everybody has great players. There's so many outstanding players because the sport is getting so popular. Even the club teams have great players. There's all kinds of young men that would just love to play varsity volleyball somewhere but they're not quite good enough so they go play for the clubs."
Or they play for Division III schools.
Space might be limited at the highest level, but in Division III there's been enough growth that it helps sustain the NCAA collegiate championship.
While contraction, not growth, has been the theme at the Division I level, the number of Division III teams has steadily climbed.
Statistics show that the number of Division I schools has hovered in the lower twenties the last 10 years.
After the 2000 season, San Diego State and Loyola Marymount dropped their programs to bring the total to 22 or 6.8 percent of Division I institutions.
In Division III, however, there were 15 registered teams in 1982, but now that number has jumped to 42. Not coincidentally, only 54 percent of these schools sponsor football.
Pepperdine coach Marv Dunphy, a former national team coach and an assistant coach with the U.S. national team in the Sydney Olympics, says that the NCAA looks at multiple levels in deciding whether or not a sport is viable.
He said the participation rate of member institutions is a factor. But, since volleyball is an Olympic sport, it also gets placed in a different category. And the NCAA also looks to see if a championship pays for itself.
Men's volleyball has been a four-team national championship tournament since its inception in 1970. Since the NCAA took over, it has stayed the same size.
"The NCAA is happy with men's volleyball," Dunphy said. "Men's volleyball is in good shape. It's not just me saying that. Our championship event does real, real well.
"We have a final four, it's not a big field like men's and women's basketball and women's volleyball. Because of that, we're not a drain on anybody. In fact, that's a plus."
And though no Division III team has ever received a berth into the NCAA tournament, the growth in this division has enabled the sport to continue at all levels.
The coaches don't see the loss of Loyola Marymount and San Diego State as a reflection of the health of volleyball. Rather, they see the sport as the victim of ailing athletic departments.
"Ninety percent of the teams that have football teams lose money in the NCAA so if they get down a million or two, they look for sports to cut," Scates said.
"They can't cut a women's program so they cut a men's program. So you see your wrestling, your water polo, your men's gymnastics, your men's swimming and in a few cases men's volleyball. Those programs are being dropped."
And the fact that very few men's sports are experiencing growth at the Division I level shows that the freeze is being felt everywhere.
Men's water polo, now with 23 teams and 7.2 percent participation, has 12 fewer teams than it did in 1987 when it reached its participation peak.
The number of wrestling programs at all three levels has also steadily declined in the last 20 years with the current number of Division I programs at 90, which is 25 percent fewer than when the sport began.
The numbers for other men's sports is only mildly comforting. Though volleyball isn't endangered, it's still not totally healthy.
"Anyway you look at it, we're below the cutoff level," Hawaii coach Mike Wilton said. "But I think the popularity of the sport and perhaps the success of our international teams, the fact that it's popular and it gets pretty good ratings on TV, that's keeping it going.
"I've thought about it before because I want to coach. I want to keep coaching. I hope that this keeps going, but I think about it and sometimes I wonder. I want to be coaching 10 years from now, but will there still be men's volleyball? And we know women's volleyball isn't going anywhere."
When: 7 p.m. today and tomorrow Gameday
Where: Stan Sheriff Center
TV: Live, KFVE-TV (Channel 5)
Radio: Live, 1420-AM
Internet: kccn1420am.comNotes: Hawaii leads the series 25-0. ... The Warriors have lost eight games total in the previous meetings. ... The closest UCSD came to winning in recent years was in 2000 in San Diego, when it forced a fifth game.Probable starters
Hawaii (7-2, 4-0)
Ht. KPG Aces Digs S Kimo Tuyay (So.) 6-2 .31 1 48 MB Dejan Miladinovic (Sr.) 6-7 2.35 1 10 MB Brian Nordberg (Jr.) 6-5 1.70 2 2 OH Costas Theocharidis (Jr.) 6-3 5.79 8 63 OH Jose Delgado (Fr.) 6-3 2.60 4 47 OH Eyal Zimet (Jr.) 6-2 2.50 4 60 L Vernon Podlewski (Sr.) 5-8 NA NA 66
UC San Diego (1-7, o-6)
Ht. KPG Aces Digs S Jordon Hove (Sr.) 6-2 .81 1 6 MB Eric Perrine (Jr.) 6-3 2.04 10 10 MB S.Oksenendler (So.) 6-2 2.00 2 1 OH Griffin Cogorno (Sr.) 6-5 2.48 8 26 OH Chris Mortimer (Jr.) 6-1 .84 3 34 Opp Jim Waller (So.) 6-4 3.80 9 21 L Dickens Tai (So.) 5-6 NA NA 21
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